ForbesOnTech

All I Really Want in a Mobile App is Great Mobile Commerce and a Secure ID

A recent survey on domestic  US cell phone usage points to the fact that, forced to chose between a cell phone and a wallet, many people would prefer to ditch that bulging piece of cured animal flesh stuffed in their back pocket for a mobile phone that does more than merely let you talk.

            For reasons that remain unclear to me, many US wireless phone users can’t get next to the potential of their mobile phones. And network providers aren’t much help in pushing cell phones to new levels either. They’re too married to the mistaken belief I really want to watch television or grainy YouTube videos on a tiny screen.

Have entrepreneurs really done their homework?  Is there a single mobile phone software developer who can sit in a face to face meeting and tell me that they’ve ever seen a group of domestic US subscribers playing cell phonegames on the train to San Francisco from Palo Alto, or better yet, has anyone ever seen a mobile phone user so caught up in a game they missed their destination on the BART crossing from the East Bay to San Francisco?

            Guess what? Mobile cell phone games are still a $0 sum market in the US.

            Maybe the next big thing might be mobile search—which makes money for the search engine provider, and the network, but  not the company that was searched for in the first place.

            I think it’s time to pull back the focus on mobile phone apps for a minute and see if we can isolate one application that becomes the horse pulling the mobile the application cart. Let’s look at the matrix:

            Standardized Bluetooth or network connectivity to retail outlets?

Check. It’s there, at long last

            Consumer willingness to explore the capabilities of next generation smart phones? Yup, we got a market that’s doing that as well. That box gets a check mark too.

            Consumer banks willing to let customers access and perform transactions from their cell phones?  Check.

            Let’s take a look through the vciew finder at mobile technology and think about what’s missing. I think the answer to that is a glaringly obvious application that’s the first step up the ziggurat that represents this market.

            The application is one that lets me carry my identity and specific financial and other information on my cell phone.  I would like to be able to beam encrypted data to kiosks and transact a little business.

            For example, about twice a year I wander into the local BassPro mega store and buy a couple saltwater lures and a button-down long sleeve shirt that looks fabulous when starched and ironed. When I go into BassPro, I don’t mind that they know I’m there and I’m not offended if they try to sell me something. What a joy it would be to use my cell phone as part of my credit or debit card transaction.

            Take this a step further. If the information stored in my phone is at least128-bit secure, includes a current photo and address and has my California driver’s license number as well as a another unique identification number such as my passport ID number, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be able to use to board an airplane to fly hither and yon domestically.

            The big catch, of course is getting Homeland Security and its TSA organization to buy into a non-paper system. It’s at this step where the need for a trusted software brand that’s accustomed to dealing with the government comes in. Right off the top of my head examples of brands that already have this relationship and the skills to build such an application (which could be used for both mobile commerce  and personal identification) include: Oracle, Intuit, Microsoft, and a couple of others.

            I’m not naïve enough to believe that a switch from a paper-based or laminated plastic system to electronic ID may happen overnight. I am however patient enough to carry my cell phone and my wallet until all the bugs get worked out.

            I think this is important enough that I’m willing to pay $25 a year for this service. And, like when I recently lost my driver’s license on a business trip to San Francisco, this type of software seems like a more effective of validating who I am, thanusing my Sam’s Club member card that has my picture on it.

            This is exactly the sort of concept I’d love to see shown at Demo in the coming years. Let’s see, a secure electronic document I can carry in my cell phone or a bulging piece of old animal flesh stuck in the back pocket of my jeans?  Not much of a choice is it?—Jim Forbes, 08/22/1008.

Midomi Mobile, Perfect Harmony in Music Search-- Right Place Right Time With an iPhone App

Apple opened it’s iPhone online applications store concurrently with the public release of its new 3G iPhone this week. I guess we can all relax now, the sun is coming up in the post-launch world and there appears to be an initial strong flood tide of applications for Apple’s mobile platform.

            There are few surprises in the first round of iPhone applications; location-centric, business, entertainment and personal productivity applications are a;; represented.

            But initially I wanted to focus on an iPhone version of an application category I’ve watched since the 1990’s—music. High on my list of “hot iPhone apps” is  a music search application called Midomi Mobile. What this application does that’s heretofore been missing in music search, is allow its users to hum, sing, and use multiple modes of inputting rough data to find individual or groups of songs.

            Midomi Mobile is from a Sunnyvale startup called Melodis Corp, whose sound recognition-based search technology is something that’s been missing in Internet –based music services until very recently. Midomi Mobile works even if you can’t carry a tune, or if your singing voice sounds like a bullfrog being castrated. Melodis claims it’s musical search technology is extremely accurate.

            In my continuing quest to fill out my 1970’s music catalogue, I’d love to try and hum a few bars from Little Feet’s “song “Red Streamliner” or the Allman’s Brothers “Les Bres in A Minor” to see if this service delivers on its promises. Or, I just might get up around 3 AM and record birdsongs in my orchard to see I it understands I’m trying to identify and locate the Beatles song “Blackbird (singing in the dead of night)”

            The online video demonstration of Midomi is one of the most compelling consumer technology pitches I’ve ever viewed. It’s exactly the sort of pitch that I would respond to when picking companies for Demo, before my retirement several years ago. Besides its apparent accuracy in returning results to difficult queries entered by off-key singing, humming or haphazard lyrics entry, Midomi also has features that let you annotate and share query results and in some cases music, with friends or readers of personal blogs. The new iPhone application also provides simple one-click links to music and related content from sites such as iTunes.

            But what really makes my heart sing about Midomi Mobile is that it’s a perfect match for two key Apple business strategies; iPhone and iTunes. It’s dificul;t to imagine this three-year–old start up not being pitched heavily by Apple when it needs to demonstrate technologies that bolster its key business units.

            Other music search services have come and gone-- but I suspect Melodis’ Midomi Mobile will set a new gold standard in this category. The technology is tightly linked to Apple and this developer is fosued sharply on an application category that show almost no signs of slowing its hockey stick growth.—Jim Forbes—07/11/2008.

What Does $100 Million For iPhone Developers Buy Apple?--Platform Legitimacy!

The creation of a $100 million fund that’s designed to fuel development of business and other applications for Apple’siPhone could be just the push Apple needs to continue its success.

            Administered by top-ranked Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, the iPhone fund has met with unprecedented demand for meetings with the administering firm and downloads of software development kits (SDKs) from Apple. Apple reported earlier this week that its IPhone SDK had been downloaded more than 100,000 times.  Meanwhile, up on Sandhill Road in Menlo Park, CA, KPCB is reportedly seeing meeting requests from startups and established developers alike. All of which want a piece of the iPhone iFund’s gold-laden bandwagon.

            KPCB’s iFund has the same value as it’s Java Fund from the 1990’s. Apple and KPCB officials are hopeful developers will respond to funding with games, location-based services as well as enterprise and personal applications.

            Although games for mobile phones have not gained wide acceptance in the US market, they represent significant revenue in offshore markets such as Asia and Europe. I believe the iPhone with its above average graphics could be the mobile phone platform that makes games a profitable venture for US software developers and their wireless carrier partners. In addition its use of internal hardware that senses whether the phone is being used in landscape or portrait modes could be a boost for games developers looking for a viable platform.

            There are other applications I hope show up for the iPhone. Foremost among those are location based services including generating relevant local coupons. Banking and personal finance packages are other applications that could drive iPhone sales and help carriers.  Chase as well as other banks are now actively advertising the use of mobile phones as a method to check account balances, but the technology could be made much more capable, allowing consumers to perform all of the same financial tasks using their cell phones as they do on their primary computers (view balances as well as manipulate accounts and financial positions).      

            In reports that surfaced earlier this week, there was at least one mention that Apple would need to approve applications for its iPhone.

            According to Kleiner Perkins, the iFund will makes investments as little as $100,000 in seed financing and up to $15 million in expansion funding for mobile applications or services companies. The venture firm also noted that if the demand for iPhone funding exceeded $100 million, the company would raise additional funding.

            The importance of funding programs that are limited to specific platforms is hard to understate, I believe.  Like all risk financing based enterprises, there are many more failures than successes. The Java fund, for example, isn’t notable for the number of its long-term high flyers, but rather that it helped make Java a commonly used platform throughout various computing environments.  Take Marimba Software as an example. It got a lot of attention in the period during and after its funding. But today Marimba is little more than a historical footnote to an earlier time in the entrepreneurial environment of the 1990’s. Now a part of BMC Software Solutions Inc. in Houston, Marimba’s platform is widely used to assess the impact of changes in software throughout an organization.

            The ifund could have the same impact on Apple’s iPhone as the Java Fund had on Sun’s Java platform.  The winner isn’t likely to be any one company or group of entrepreneurs, but rather Apple and its iPhone.

            But Apple could discover a very hungry carnivore hiding out in the dark a few months out. That beast is Google’s Android smart phone architecture and when it hits the US market Apple could find itself in hard fight for the life of the iPhone.

            And it’s too early to count out Palm, which has relationships with most of the major carriers and whose base of users and developers is nearly as loyal as Apple’s. Later this year, Palm is expected to roll out a new version of its Palm OS.

            Let’s see, who do I trust more, Apple or Google? Can I ask the cannibals to dine somewhere else?—Jim Forbes 03/14/2007.

Google,the iPhone and Mobil Commerce--Can You Hear the Steam Roller Coming?

   If you're paying close attention to Apple's television iPhone ads, you've seen what could be Google's most important contribution to mobile computing; presence-related commerce listings.

   The segment of the iphone ad showing someone reacting to  a spur of the moment whim for seafood and using his iPhone to pull up a list of nearby restaurants and their locations is the best example I've seen yet of location or presence-based commerce.

    It's an important component in mobile services and its probably going to become one of Google's, not Apple's or AT&T's, crown jewels.

    I still travel a great deal-- like a great many retired Americans-- and I'm just as subject to whims as the next person, even if that person is a mega-buck venture capitalist. Would I like to be able to search for a good BBQ restaurant when I'm in Sacramento? Or good to the last bite of tortilla Mexican food, when I'm in Azusa?

    "Hell yes I'd like to know where those restaurants are and how to get to them when I'm in the tiny berg of Rescue, CA or in Azusa, in southern CA."  The cell phone is the perfect instrument for delivering that information to me when I think I need it. But like most people, I'm not just interested in restaurant information. I can guarantee that I'm also a good market for concert and entertainment data, as well as the location of good VW mechanics, the occasional organic produce market and sometimes even a good ole fashioned gun show at some run down county fairground.

    But back to Google, mobile search, cell carriers, the i-, g-, and other cell phones. Mobile and presence-based platforms will be transformational. First, the capabilities of such devices will require that Google, Yahoo, AOL, or any other company that wants to play in this space will need to focus on carrier relationships, a task most silicon valley-based technology companies have failed miserably. And carriers know that presence based commerce represents a multi-river revenue stream, but are mostly unprepared to sell ads to local merchants, and the smallish ad agencies that serve regional markets. The same, for now, is also true of Google.  While its sales force is going great guns, it's in the unique position of making numbers by collecting the cream at the top of the market milk bottles.

    The problem with the current market is that the majority of the businesses--except banking institutions-- i want to use my cell phone to connect with in the mobile search model are in the twitchy category called "Small business."

    Can you imagine the scream from Master Mechanic Terry at Father Noel's Volkswagen Workstadt in San Mateo when he's told the cost of being a mobile advertiser with Google will be $15,000 or so a month? I think I'll be able to hear him tell the innocent ad sales person to "sod off" all the way down here in Southern California. The same scene will be repeated at Carmen's' and LaTolteca in Azusa, except the profanities will be yelled using words I understand, but which would have caused Little Jimmy's mouth to get washed out with lye soap by Mama Helen, the "mamacita" of my youth.

    So the question then for Google, Apple and others at the top end of the chain becomes "what do we have to provide small businesses to entice them onto the mobile commerce bandwagon?" This is a much more complex scenario that I think will involve carriers, or regional portals. And the more I think about it, the more i believe that this is a space where Yahoo, regional advertising consortia or even AOL, as well as established media organizations like the LA Times and McClatchy Media can establish viable commercial positions.

    Think for a minute, what organization has the contacts and experience needed to sell mobile, presence-based advertising to small businesses? I don't think its Google or even AT&T/Cingular.

    One of the steepest angles in the geometry of mobile commerce that needs to be overcome is the glacial pace at which US consumers adopt new handset technologies. And for mobile commerce to take off new handsets are needed. Throwaway flip phones lack the horsepower, interface, screen and other attributes needed to make mobile search and mobile commerce a compelling consumer experience. Apple's iPhone is a great first step, but in reality it's little more than a basic technology demonstrator.

   My bet, however, is that it's such a good basic platform the technology preview events scheduled for later this year will--for the first time-- be awash in Apple hardware, which means that to facilitate good demonstrations and overcome the weaknesses of the Cingular network, most of the producers of thiese show, and the demonstrators that use iPhones, should now be contacting AT&T/Cingular to make sure they have the requisite COWs (cell towers on wheels) in place to insure good iPhone demonstrations.

    In conclusion, iPhone is a great first step, and Google probably isn't very far behind. Both companies have the capabilities to prize open the mobile commerce market, which will be driven partly by mobile search. However, in the emerging mobile commerce model, new partners that can work with Google, hardware makers (handset) and cell networks are needed. The sales and marketing professionals who can tactically drive this are not found at Google or among cell phone network corporations, they'll come from regional media outlets, savvy portals like Yahoo and anyone else who beats the bushes and drums up businesses with small businesses, which are the backbone of regional markets.

    For ten years-- going back to my tenure as a Demo event producer, I've beat the drums for mobile search driven, presence-enabled electronic commerce.  Over time I came to believe problems with Blue tooth hand set implementations, poor cell network signal saturation, and faulty WAP browser code hindered adoption. All those problems have now been solved and the time and technologies are in alignment.    At last.

   Can I get an "Amen," brothers and sisters-- Jim Forbes still beating the mobile commerce parade drum from a rural mountain top in rural San Diego County.